


A Monster in the Closet

by Healy



Category: Original Work
Genre: Elementals, Friendship, Gen, ToT: Chocolate Box, ToT: Monster Mash, ToT: Treat - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-05
Updated: 2016-10-05
Packaged: 2018-08-19 19:14:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8221832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Healy/pseuds/Healy
Summary: Eliza Ashwell, apprentice witch, was looking for cleaning supplies in the basement closet. What she didn't expect to find was a friend.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fenellaevangela](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fenellaevangela/gifts).



It was almost noon, nearly time for Eliza to finish up her chores for the morning and break for lunch. She rechecked the to-do list her mistress gave her: she had already trimmed the hedges, collected reagents from the garden, and fed the mistress’s familiars, but she still needed to mop and scrub the cauldron room.

Eliza sighed. This was her least favorite task to do. The residues from the potions were often very sticky, and they had a habit of getting everywhere. (She still keenly remembered one incident where her hand got stuck to the floor, and required an unfasting spell to get free again.) To clean the cauldron room properly, she’d need the big guns. She put away her to-do list and walked carefully down the rickety spiral staircase to the dungeon. She then walked down a winding hallway to the closet where her mistress kept the specially enchanted cleaning equipment.

She opened the door to the closet, only to find a strange, blobby creature waiting inside. “Um,” said Eliza, “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were here.”

The creature stared at her for a while with its watery eyes, then parted his middle to speak. “AAAAUGH!” he screamed. “AUUUUUUUGH!!”

“Oh!” cried Eliza. “Don’t be frightened. I work for Madame Eloise DeGiza, High Witch of Wastewater; I’m her apprentice.”

This introduction did nothing to calm the monster down. “Don’t hurt me!” he screamed. “I wasn’t planning on staying—don’t hurt me!”

“Er, I take it you’re not an official guest of Wastewater Castle?” asked Eliza.

“Oh no, no, no,” said the monster. “I’m a water elemental from the Lowlands. I came up here to visit my cousin, but I got caught in the _strangest_ raimstorms.”

“Ah, yes,” said Eliza, “this place is called Wastewater for a reason. But how did you end up in the castle?”

“I was washed into an underground river. Couldn’t get back above for days. I swam into a culvert hoping it would lead to a passage out, but it came out into this dungeon.”

“And, not knowing where you were, you hid yourself in a closet,” said Eliza. The monster nodded. “Well, anyone would be frightened out of their wits at such a situation. You needn’t worry anymore.” She held out her hand. “My name is Eliza Ashwell. What’s yours?”

The monster reached out with a watery appendage and shook Eliza’s hand. “Peter Pondmettle, at your service.”

“I will gladly show you the way out of the castle, but first, I need to clean the castle’s cauldron room. Would you like to come with me, Mr. Pondmettle?”

“Just Peter will do,” he replied. “And gladly.”

With the proper supplies in tow, they both headed up the stairs to the cauldron room, Eliza treading carefully on her two feet, Peter sloshing up like a waterfall that had run backward. They passed door after door down an endless hallway, until at last they reached the room they came for.

“Here we are!” cried Eliza. She entered and set down her bucket. “You can watch if you like, Peter.”

“Thank you.” Peter sloshed inside, being careful not to spread water everywhere.

Eliza moved the cauldrons out of the room, then got to work on the floors. First, she wiped the whole floor down with a mop, careful not to miss a spot. Then she sat down with a sponge and started scrubbing. Even with the magic soap, mop, and sponge, it took a lot of hard work to clean up all the stains and residues. “Oh dear,” said Eliza, “if I don’t clean this all up soon I’ll be late for lunch.”

“Would you like some help, Eliza?” asked Peter. He had been sitting quietly in a dusty corner up ‘til then.

“I don’t see why you can’t.”

Peter whooshed out of the corner and began chanting:  
“ _Hocus, pocus,_  
_Crimson crocus,_  
_Let the water pool and focus._  
_Purify it well and good_  
_To make it as it once had stood._ ”

With that the wet floor put on a dazzling display of many changing colors (kind of like fireworks at New Years, Eliza thought), until it became, amazingly enough, clean enough to sparkle.

“I didn’t know you did magic,” gasped Eliza, as she stared at her own reflection on the floor.

“It’s an old water elemental trick,” Peter replied. “I can show you how to do it. Unless you want to get lunch first, of course.”

* * *

“So that’s when my father told those naiads off,” said Peter as he followed Eliza to the castle’s gates. “Gave them a mouthful of a lecture, he did.”

“Your family is so funny!” said Eliza. “It’s a shame that you’re leaving so soon; I’d love to hear more about them.”

“Well, I could always come visit. Now that I know the way to your castle, it would be easy for me to make a sidetrip here, next time I visit my cousin.”

“Oh, would you?” asked Eliza. “That would be ever so nice. We don’t get many visitors here in Wastewater.”

“I would be glad to,” said Peter. “But ah,” he cried, as he turned the corner, “I do believe we’ve the gate. Farewell, Eliza.”

Eliza turned the winch to open the gate. “Goodbye, Peter! Until we meet again.”

Peter crossed the gate to the other side of the moat, then turned back to Eliza and waved. “Goodbye!” he cried.

Eliza waved back at him until he disappeared from view. Then she closed the gate back up and headed to the kitchen. It was high time that she got some lunch.


End file.
